Note: You’d like to have a very smooth paper to work with pen and inks as they will give you the best result for your finished work. In other words, inks look better on smooth paper vs. rough paper like watercolor paper. =)

Hope this helps make choosing supplies for Inktober easier for you! Feel free to contact me with any questions if you have any.

]]>https://fortheartistsoul.com/inktober-art-kit/feed/0123Tips for Inktober Beginners – How to make the most of Inktoberhttps://fortheartistsoul.com/tips-inktober-beginners-make-inktober/
https://fortheartistsoul.com/tips-inktober-beginners-make-inktober/#respondSat, 30 Sep 2017 19:42:02 +0000https://fortheartistsoul.com/?p=114How to make the most of Inktober To help me prepare for Inktober, I came up with some tips for myself to get organized for the challenge! I think it might be helpful to share it with others, so here they are. =D TIPS To make this more fun and personal, choose your own signature […]

To help me prepare for Inktober, I came up with some tips for myself to get organized for the challenge! I think it might be helpful to share it with others, so here they are. =D

TIPS

To make this more fun and personal, choose your own signature theme to add on top of the practices. For instance, say I choose the theme LOVE. In that case, with my practices of boxes on Day 1, I want to get to a point where I can comfortable draw a heart-shaped box of chocolates. If I choose FAIRIES for my theme and I’m drawing Day 2’s prompt, I’ll draw a little fairy next to an egg, or draw a fairy on the egg. Take this time to get creative!

If you can’t find any of the items or places in real life, you can look at references or look for a master painting that incorporates the subject of the day. It’s okay to use references for now as you’re still practicing. When you have more time and resources, look into setting up your own still lifes or go out draw!

Try to fill up a whole page with multiple practice drawings for each prompt for Week 1. Don’t worry about getting your drawings accurate the first time. I’ve said this before but it’s all about getting used to the materials, being aware and celebrating where you are now, and just putting something down on paper everyday.

Use one sketchbook to practice with the different subjects and ideas and another sketchbook or drawing paper to do full illustrations.

Set a set time in the day to complete a drawing each day and commit yourself to it! See it as a job contract with yourself. Like you just signed up for your first job ever! You want to show up every day on time and do the work. Good thing is, you aren’t getting graded and you’re not going to get fired if you don’t get your work done. As long as you show up, you’ll get paid (in confidence and improvements). And when you keep showing up, people will take notice, and eventually, you get paid in never-ending streams of happy, paying clients. ^_^

EXTRA CHALLENGES

Don’t use pencil to sketch anything! If you make a mistake, make something out of it. Life is all about taking imperfect action and making the most of it. ^_^ This will also save you time too!

It was a tip above but it can also be considered a challenge! Come up with your own signature theme so you can make the challenge fun and personal! Think of one element you want featured in every piece. Ideally, this element is special and meaningful to you. Look up references and just draw/sketch so much of it, you don’t have to look at references anymore to execute a pretty convincing copy of it. =)

If you have any other tips to prepare for Inktober, please comment below! I’m sure they will be helpful to others!

And if you haven’t already done the 5-Day Mini Course challenge on How to Prepare for Inktober as a Beginner, check out the first day practice here! >>

]]>https://fortheartistsoul.com/tips-inktober-beginners-make-inktober/feed/0114How to Prepare for Inktober for Beginners – Day 5https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-5/
https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-5/#respondSat, 30 Sep 2017 18:43:07 +0000https://fortheartistsoul.com/?p=113Note: This post is part of a 5-day series on How to Prepare for Inktober for Beginners. If you haven’t already done the exercises for Day 1-4, please check those out first! >>. If you’ve already done exercises for Days 1-4, then you’re on the last day! Woot woot! Go ahead and complete it below! =D […]

]]>Note: This post is part of a 5-day series on How to Prepare for Inktober for Beginners. If you haven’t already done the exercises for Day 1-4, please check those out first! >>.

If you’ve already done exercises for Days 1-4, then you’re on the last day! Woot woot! Go ahead and complete it below! =D

Day 5: Pretest: Let’s see where you are now!

Take a photo reference or master drawing from your folder of inspiration that you intend to use for week 2 (ideally a full drawing) and “copy” it. Yes, I said copy. Just for practice! Either set up a time limit of 1-3 hours if you’ve got work or school or time yourself as you draw if you have that luxury. Whatever you do, just have some sort of time in place. You will get a sense of how long it would take for you to complete a drawing as best as you can right where you are now so you can better plan for the next one (and see if you get faster!)Just relax into drawing and see what you can do! =D

Then as you work on the following exercises for the month and get to drawing again and again, when you get to the piece that you’ve drawn before the challenge, you can see how you’ve improved in terms of speed and/or execution! I think that’s freakin’ exciting!!!

Get used to the “imperfections and incompleteness” of the work and just enjoy the process. =) Keep trying different techniques or test yourself with some limitations, like inking with one material only or using all of them in one piece. Just have fun!

And remember, you’re still getting warmed up! This is just getting you used to holding and using your ink materials, the different subjects you’d be drawing and overall comfortable with the process. Don’t worry if things aren’t looking the way you want or you aren’t finishing by a certain time. It’s all in the experimentation and seeing what works or doesn’t work for you. =) Most important is reflecting on your experience and seeing how you would like to execute your drawings next time. ^_^

Andddd with that, YOU’RE DONE!!! Congratulations on completing your 5-day mini course in preparing for Inktober! You definitely got this challenge in the BAG!

Now in case you’d like to have more tips on making the most of this Inktober challenge, check out further tips here! >>

]]>https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-5/feed/0113How to Prepare for Inktober for Beginners – Day 4https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-4/
https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-4/#respondSat, 30 Sep 2017 18:43:04 +0000https://fortheartistsoul.com/?p=112Note: This post is part of a 5-day series on How to Prepare for Inktober for Beginners. If you haven’t already done the exercises for Day 1-3, please check those out first! >>. If you’ve already done exercises for Days 1-3, then carry on below! =D Day 4: Brainstorm, Reference & Inspiration Gathering! Look at the […]

]]>Note: This post is part of a 5-day series on How to Prepare for Inktober for Beginners. If you haven’t already done the exercises for Day 1-3, please check those out first! >>.

If you’ve already done exercises for Days 1-3, then carry on below! =D

Day 4: Brainstorm, Reference & Inspiration Gathering!

Look at the calendar and brainstorm ideas on what you would like to draw and how you’re going to execute each day’s topic. Gather some reference photos online or in your camera files and organize them all in a folder on Google docs. Or if you’re a Pinterest person, create a new board for some photo reference and inspiration for inking!

You can even schedule a time and place to take photos or even better, gather real items and set up places to draw the subjects in real life! With all this brainstorming and reference/inspiration gathering, you won’t have to worry about spending your drawing hours during the month looking for references and coming up with ideas.

]]>https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-4/feed/0112How to Prepare for Inktober for Beginners – Day 3https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-3/
https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-3/#respondSat, 30 Sep 2017 18:43:02 +0000https://fortheartistsoul.com/?p=111Note: This post is part of a 5-day series on How to Prepare for Inktober for Beginners. If you haven’t already done the exercises for Day 1-2, please check them out here! >>. If you’ve already done exercises for Days 1-2, then carry on below! =D Day 3: Shading Time! Google ways to shade with the […]

]]>Note: This post is part of a 5-day series on How to Prepare for Inktober for Beginners. If you haven’t already done the exercises for Day 1-2, please check them out here! >>.

If you’ve already done exercises for Days 1-2, then carry on below! =D

Day 3: Shading Time!

Google ways to shade with the types of materials you have. Go from light to dark and practice it over and over again!

Then on one page, create a value chart for each material you have to see how you can get a side-by-side comparison of the lightness or darkness with each supply can get. Examine the different textures and “feeling” you can get with each material and see if you can get some cool patterns!

]]>https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-3/feed/0111How to Prepare for Inktober for Beginners – Day 2https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-2/
https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-2/#respondSat, 30 Sep 2017 18:42:59 +0000https://fortheartistsoul.com/?p=110If you haven’t already done the exercises for Day 1 for the How to Prepare for Inktober for Beginners series, please click here! >>. If so, continue below to Day 2! Day 2: Learn the Lines! On a separate piece of paper, draw two dots a few inches/cm apart. It doesn’t matter how far as […]

]]>If you haven’t already done the exercises for Day 1 for the How to Prepare for Inktober for Beginners series, please click here! >>.

If so, continue below to Day 2!

Day 2: Learn the Lines!

On a separate piece of paper, draw two dots a few inches/cm apart. It doesn’t matter how far as long as they are not right next to each other. Take your pen, examine the location of the dots, and without lifting your pen, draw a straight, swift line connecting the 2 dots. Keep repeating this exercise over and over, experimenting with varying distances between dots until you feel confident in drawing a straight, swift line by just eyeballing it. So whenever you want to connect to points together or draw a certain line with a particular length, just be aware of where you want the ends of the lines to be. Then draw the line.

]]>https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-2/feed/0110How to Prepare for Inktober for Beginners – Day 1https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-1/
https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-1/#respondSat, 30 Sep 2017 05:24:31 +0000https://fortheartistsoul.com/?p=99Inktober could be difficult to complete successfully and you may feel discouraged in the middle of the challenge if it’s you’re first time tackling the challenge AND using inks. Thus, I decided to created 5 days worth of exercises to help you get warmed up and REALLY prepared for Inktober. Think of it like a […]

]]>Inktober could be difficult to complete successfully and you may feel discouraged in the middle of the challenge if it’s you’re first time tackling the challenge AND using inks.

Thus, I decided to created 5 days worth of exercises to help you get warmed up and REALLY prepared for Inktober. Think of it like a mini prep course. =D

I initially created this week to get prepared myself since I’m not much of an inker, so I thought I’d share it with you too! Here goes!

Day 1: Get to Know Your Ink Materials!

Get used to the materials you plan to use by drawing lines to see the different thickness and lines you can make with a particular pen, brush, marker or ink. After testing each material, label each set of lines with the name of the material you use so you can refer back to it again like a cheat sheet if you ever need a particular thickness or style in your strokes!

]]>https://fortheartistsoul.com/prepare-inktober-beginners-day-1/feed/099INKTOBER CALENDAR FOR BEGINNERS 2017https://fortheartistsoul.com/inktober-beginners/
https://fortheartistsoul.com/inktober-beginners/#respondFri, 29 Sep 2017 00:39:33 +0000https://fortheartistsoul.com/?p=84If you are new to Inktober and need a little guidance in learning how to do Inktober, using inks, or how to draw, I created this Beginner Inktober Calendar that might help.

]]>As an artist who has never done Inktober and not have much experience drawing, you may find it overwhelming to come up with completely new concepts for the challenge as most artist do. I know it was for me.

So as a beginner you can use the calendar above just get used to inking and learning the medium without the stress of completing an incredible ink piece.

Oh, and no need to take a screenshot. I can send you a high-resolution file so you can print out.

I came up with this calendar for myself because I know I’m not that great at inking yet and that I REALLY want to improve. I also take a huge amount of time trying to come up with concept related to the original Inktober prompts that I don’t even get to drawing anything.

I’m not looking to get stumped this year, so I came up with the following the Beginner Inktober Calendar to make it easier for me to simply practice the medium with set subject matters we can easily find at home, in our own backlog of photos, and online.

If some of you have taken art classes before, you’ll probably notice how “school-like” and “structured” it is. Especially with the week of shapes and still-lifes. Bleh, who likes drawing those? Aha, not me, that’s for sure!

Like me, you probably want to create my own unique designs and illustrations, right? Screw the practice.

But I KNOW now after creating my own concepts how important it is to get those foundations down before nose-diving into an original illustration. Without it, it’s pretty difficult to translate the ideas I have in my mind on paper.

There’s really nothing to be ashamed about in using references to practice and copying from old masters to learn. Great artists continue to go back to drawing from life and doing studies consistently.

And if you’re like me who has very few art instruction in her life but is an extremely independent and self-reliant learner, I think this improvement challenge might be useful for you too!

Or if you want to tackle Inktober this year, you can use this calendar as warm ups to your illustrations or on days when you’re really stumped.

Below are additional tips and how to prepare for Inktober the week before it starts. I’ll be going over each of the preparation days on my Youtube channel For The Artist Soul. I’m a little behind on it at the moment, so you can take a look at my explanations below.